Show Business - The Road to Broadway
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DVD Cover Information
Actor: Alan Cumming, Boy George, Jason Moore, Joe Mantello, John LahrBrand: WELLSPRING/GENIUS
Composer: Jeanine Tesori
Cinematographer: Alan Deutsch
DVD: Region Code 1
Audio: English (Original Language)
Format: Closed-captioned, Color, DVD-Video, NTSC, Widescreen
Picture Format: 1.33:1
Running Time: 104 minutes
DVD Release Date: 2007-10-16
Audience Rating: PG (Parental Guidance Suggested)
Studio: Liberation Ent
Movie Reviews of Show Business - The Road to Broadway
Movie Review: Curtain Up!
Summary: 5 Stars
"ShowBusiness: The Road to Broadway"
Curtain Up!
Amos Lassen
We love theater and we love Broadway but seldom do we get to know what goes on behind the scenes. Here! TV is screening the documentary "ShowBusiness: The Road to Broadway" and it is an in depth look behind the scenes of four major Broadway shows--two successes, one bomb and one that almost became a hot ticket. All four shows--"Wicked", "Taboo", "Avenue Q" and "Caroline, or Change" were nominated for the Tony Award (Broadway's highest award) as best musical of 2004. The documentary takes us behind the scenes from the initial casting to the out of town previews and to the awards ceremony and gives us a look at the inner workings of the Broadway Theater. We have interviews with the principals, the actors, the creators, the critics. We have film of rehearsals and opening nights and we get an all around look at the world of theater.
Many feel that musical theater is as American as apple pie and mom. But musicals do not appeal to everyone as we have seen with the demise of musical motion pictures. But for me, there is nothing better than a Broadway musical. When the overture begins, I feel as if I am transported to another world and for the next two hours, I am on the stage with the show. Of course the Broadway Theater is not what it once was and the glorious musicals of yesteryear are not around any more except in revivals. However, there is still a life left in the theater as this movie shows us. Dori Bernstein has assembled a beautiful homage to theater after whittling down over 250 hours of film and we go where the action is--backstage, where creativity reigns. The documentary moves quickly and jumps from show to show. Nonetheless, we get a beautiful movie and a look at the theater we rarely see. Let's face it--the days of "My Fair Lady", "Showboat" and "Oklahoma" are no more but we have something else--a youthful creativity that is trying to revive a theater that is so important to all of us.
Here is an alterative look at theater. The shows features here are unique in their own way--one deals with racial relations in the South, one with the land of Oz. one with club kids and one is a glorified puppet show. We see how people finance the activity, how actors interpret the material and how changes are made. This is a fun movie and its intentions are noble and the documentary is at times highly emotional. I unquestionably love this movie but then I love theater.
To me going to the Broadway Theater is akin to going to a temple for prayer and I revere it and honor it. So does this film.
Summary of Show Business - The Road to Broadway
The real drama happens behind the curtain in this fascinating and rare look at four high-profile Broadway musicals (Wicked, Taboo, Caroline, Or Change, and Avenue Q) and their fearless journey to the Tony Awards?. Including a star-studded cast, this entertaining film takes viewers on an unprecedented behind-the-scenes view of the creative process that captures all the heartbreak and hilarity of trying make it big in Show Business!The playful but intense and vastly informative Show Business: The Road to Broadway is a documentary about four musicals that were contenders for top Tony Awards prizes in the 2004 Broadway season. Following the parallel action between the quartet--"Wicked," "Avenue Q," "Taboo," and "Caroline, or Change"--from concept through casting, rewrites, rehearsals, opening nights and the relative box-office fortunes of each, the film dazzles a viewer by seeming to be everywhere at once. Along the way, one encounters cascades of neuroses and anxieties from the creative community involved in these shows, but there is also tremendous insight shared by the various playwrights, composers, lyricists, producers, directors, and stars who get these productions up and running. There's sundry drama, too, especially concerning the brief run of "Taboo," the financially disastrous musical about Boy George that was largely bankrolled by Rosie O'Donnell and ran into a variety of problems. Excellent fly-on-the-wall moments include a dinner sequence involving a handful of well-known theatre critics, whose tastes vary and who often champion shows no one else seems to like. Everything leads to highlights from the 2004 Tony Awards show, which was full of surprises. A final sequence in which one catches up with the many talents involved says everything about how success and failure is often a mere roll of the cosmic dice. --Tom Keogh
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